


that's the beauty of a secret (you know you're supposed to keep it)

by poisonrain



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alcohol, Alternate Universe - College/University, Angst, Cheating, F/F, First Kiss
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-21
Updated: 2016-04-10
Packaged: 2018-05-22 11:30:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6077682
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/poisonrain/pseuds/poisonrain
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>But even algebra can't explain why she's currently half drunk and half damned, not-so-cold palms resting dangerously on top of her best friend's. (And no solution on earth, could calculate the mass, weight, configuration of stars, in a sky she thought had long turned black.)</p>
<p>“- it's just, we'll never really know what Aristotle said about comedy,” Lexa semi-slurs, scooting closer to Clarke's section of the couch. “Doesn't that drive you crazy?”</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Clarke loves Finn. It's simple math. Meet cute in a college bar equals coffee dates and matching mugs, holding gloved hands as ageing fingers sprout roots and turn to dust. _(Does boredom personified, make an oxymoron of domestic lust?)_

But even algebra can't explain why she's currently half drunk and half damned, not-so-cold palms resting dangerously on top of her best friend's. (And no solution on earth, could calculate the mass, weight, _configuration_ of stars, in a sky she thought had long turned black.)

“- it's just, we'll never _really_ know what Aristotle said about comedy,” Lexa semi-slurs, scooting closer to Clarke's section of the couch. “Doesn't that drive you crazy?”

If there were ever any stereotypes about inebriated English majors, Clarke is pretty sure that Lexa is fulfilling them all, and being downright adorable in the process. She attempts a smile in return, perhaps a fond “you nerd,” but only finds herself in hazy awe of the girl, she's forever seen through a “platonic” lens.

Except, that isn't _quite_ true. Back when Lexa was dating Costia there was a “maybe” (a maybe writ in “too close” and purple prose, a soliloquy penned in the shape of her nose), but now...

Now Clarke is dating Finn, and if she's learnt anything from six years stuck in the “emo pop” of life stages, it's that them, _this,_ migraine in her chest, is wrong with a capital “W,” and “R” for good measure.

It's wrong when she mumbles “I had a really great time tonight,” just to watch Lexa blush the same shade as her very pink drink, wrong when even the righteous “ping” of the brunette's microwave, cannot break their lingering gaze.

“I should, um...”

“Y- yeah.”

Ten years of late night plans and early morning whispers, and (after an hour of barely brushing in a too-loud club, sipping colourful liquid with a suspicious amount of fizzy bubbles), the pair can't even string a sentence together? Clarke should force a laugh, but she's fairly certain her suspension bridge ribs would snap, split, _collapse._

Instead, she wills her mouth to form the word, “Popcorn?”- though she'd sooner be putting her tongue to better use, spelling out an artistic variation of “maybe crush yes,” on Lexa's exposed collarbone.

“Popcorn, right.” Her... _friend_ jumps up, and she tries her hardest not to cringe at the loss, traces over the rip in her jeans, where Lexa's fingertips just (accidentally?) touched. _She is: fire, ash, smoke, and I have already laid out_ _bare_ _bones._

“Or...” Clarke interjects, before she can help herself, vaguely able to note that it doesn't really seem all that wrong, when she grips Lexa's wrist to hold her back.

_(_ _How could she ever be a textbook Sunday school sin, when I'd drop everything on a Thursday afternoon, for the chance to pocket her grin?_ _)_

“Or what?”

There's an element of truth, of dare, like they're still thirteen year old kids who tell each other everything before bed. Perhaps this would have been simpler, then.

Clarke moves closer, so close that she can smell raspberry alcohol on Lexa's breath, so close that their heartbeats meet, melt, merge, stop-start all over again.

“I thought you were with Finn,” Lexa murmurs, and this _should_ be the point where the decidedly _un_ heroic narrator comes to her senses, chokes back selfish want and admits, “Yeah, he's still my boyfriend.” Because that's the truth, isn't it?

But all Clarke can picture is the way Lexa will recoil, revoke her waist to hip ratio, and pretend none of this ever happened. It's more than she can bear at one in the morning, at least 98% sure that this more than just the liqueur talking. _Wrong universe, wrong timeline, wrong side of the sheets// can't I still crave you, in the shape of_ _our defeats?_

“We broke up,” she says instead, and is rewarded with a kiss for her lie, a second time in the soft noise, when her teeth find the warm skin of Lexa's throat.

“Clarke, I-”

Clarke cuts her off, before she can say something stupid, something wonderful, something that would soil the unforgivable.

“Please don't, Lex. Can we, uh, can we just...” She gestures at the glass gap between them, unsure what she's even really asking, other than: “Let me pretend I deserve you.”

Her answer: Multiply hands by hair, and divide by discarded t-shirt.

And yeah, okay, Clarke Griffin may be the worst person in the entire world, but when Lexa looks at her like that, she can't help but feel like the _best._

_(_ She can hate herself tomorrow, she figures. There's an expiration date written all over the weight on her thigh, but always plenty of time for _regret.)_


	2. Chapter 2

Clarke wakes beneath the shadows of daylight, hand trapped somewhere between her best friend's chest and no-man's-land. Lexa's heartbeat flutters against her palm, loose waves wrapped taut and tight around Clarke's arm.

Her first thought is something along the lines of: “oh god, what have I done?” followed closely by “yep, pretty sure I'm going to throw up.”

But Lexa is far too beautiful to read like a mistake- saturated sunshine, reaching out to trace the blank canvas of her face. (It was Clarke who painted her in smudged crimson, and Clarke who wiped away the oil pastels).

If this wasn't five years too late, if a marker pen hadn't already mapped out their fate, surely, then, yellow-tape laughter could have been the masterpiece that their narrative deserved, the indents of shaking fingertips, just an expression of abstract art?

(Or maybe Clarke was always destined to play the part of the villain in this piece, comedic or not, and she should hurry up and accept the label, which declares her a “ _cheatliarfraud._ ”)

“C-Clarke?” Lexa murmurs, twisting and stretching beneath the sheets, her morning voice scoring a solid #1 on the list of Clarke's new-found favourite things.

“Morning, Lex. Uh, Lex _a.”_

“Good morning, Clarke.”

They lie like that for a little while, innocence on the edge of a knife, two loose threads come to bind a tie. And Lexa is warm and wonderful and wide eyed, and so _exposed_ that Clarke could die- death by jagged collarbones, found guilty without trial.

“We should, um, we should talk about last night,” she starts, cringing at their skin to skin, juxtaposed by the very shame of the thing. _It's a paradox to end all paradoxes, the moron attempting to take a moral high-ground._

Lexa recoils and withdraws, her body no longer a solid weight against Clarke's. “Oh, I'm sorry, _Clarke_ , I was the one who... I shouldn't have assumed...”

And Jesus Christ, they ( _we, this, them_ ) have never been all that religious, but when Lexa says her name like _that_ , Clarke can't help but wonder if she's reciting holy scripture, can't help but feel like they're redefining divinity. _(More like: she is the heaven I never did deserve, I am the eleventh commandment, she will forever repent)._

“No! I mean, Lex, I want, want _ed_ to-”

She's cut off by a foam bullet to the stomach, “execution via nerf gun,” apparently serving as the standard Woods' family punishment.

“Aden?” Lexa conceals her very apparent _lack_ of clothes by burrowing further into the sheets, gazing up at her younger brother, with half horror and half disbelief.

“What's up?” he greets, with all the nonchalance of a typical pre-teen.

“What's _up_? What are you doing... how did you even get here, I-”

“I drove him,” comes a not-so-twelve year old voice from over by the door, Anya now making an appearance in part ? of Clarke's nightmare scenario. “Figured we'd raid your fridge for lunch.”

Alarm bells sound at the mention of lunch, the question “how late did we sleep?” producing nothing on the right side of good.

Lexa groans. “I didn't realise it was national “inconvenience your siblings” day.”

“Why, did we _interrupt_ something?” Anya counters back, gesturing rather pointedly in Clarke's direction. Lexa blushes even darker than she did with the blonde's head between her thighs, which probably shouldn't be categorised as “adorable,” and yet...

“It's not what it looks like,” Lexa tries, which receives three pairs of raised eyebrows. (There's no escaping the faded lipstick on her jawline, teeth-mark trophies which claim “mine and only mine.”)

Anya elects to ignore her sister's indignant protests.“Clarke, you're staying for, well, “brunch,” right?”

Clarke means to say no, really she does. She means to flee this blanket-thread utopia, and finally face up to what she's done. Three words ( _I'm a liar_ ), and then she can return to her apartment in the undergrowth, miles and miles from the burning sun.

But then the sun is looking at her ~like that~, and the blonde is oh so incapable to do anything other than look back.

“I'd love to.”

(It seems that hell is more than just flame to the power of darkness squared- Clarke should know, since she's _already there_ ).

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry this is so short, but I finally figured out how I could turn this into a fic with plot and stuff, sadly I have exams next month so I'm not sure how much time I'll have to write but yeah I have some ideas if anyone would read that?

**Author's Note:**

> Follow me on tumblr (http://lizgilllies.tumblr.com/) for more fics/posts, and updates on stuff I'm writing. if you want to, of course. Also, this would probably work better and make more sense as part of a longer fic, so I might write that if anyone is interested


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